S2Ep2: Adrift (Michael's second flashback) - 9/28/05

Hello my dear friends -
I was not as enthralled with this episode as I was with the premiere... but every time I start to even think about getting disappointed by Lost, I remember all the other high quality, brain-bending, thought-provoking TV shows that have graced screens around the country recently, such as: I Want to Be a Hilton, Taradise, Hogan Knows Best, Britney & Kevin: Chaotic, The Littlest Groom, etc., etc., and then I calm down. The very worst episode of Lost bests 95% of what is on TV right now, so let's not forget that, should we ever become frustrated.

But by no means am I saying that I thought this was a bad episode... far from it. In fact, I was surprised to find that most boarders actually liked this episode way better than the premiere?!?! I wouldn't go that far, because I did think the flashbacks this time were completely useless and repetitive, and I wasn't really even a fan of any of the raft scenes. But I loved how the HatchBacks brought us up to speed on what happened in the hatch from Kate and Locke's points of view, I thought that was brilliant. Last week I was stewing over how I didn't know what transpired between Locke and Desmond before Jack arrived. And speaking of Desmond (aka Hatch Man), he is now officially my #2 favorite character. If you can't tell, I like crazy/sane people.

Regarding the flashbacks in general, people are very split on if they like this format or not. I highly doubt they're going to all of a sudden STOP showing flashbacks, so you might as well get used to them if you don't like them. I know that they are trying very, very, very hard to NOT fall into The X-Files trap of getting fans so wrapped up in the 'mythology' of the show that they will never be able to satisfy anyone with any answers they eventually dole out. So therefore they keep saying that this show is about the characters, and that is always going to be the writers' main focus. As I was a long-suffering mega-fan of The X-Files for all nine seasons (I even went to two conventions - yes, my dear friends, THAT is the level of nerdiness you are dealing with here! (shout out to Nerdy P, who was with me at 1 of them)), I can say that they are smart to take this approach. Because if, as they've said before, they actually do have this series planned out loosely for at LEAST five years, they are going to have to keep answering questions but also raising new ones, and if none of us care about the characters, then it's probably not going to work. So, I will deal with lame flashbacks such as Michael's because I know overall it is worth it over time.
Here are new things to ponder:

ONE QUESTION ANSWERED!
Hear ye, hear ye, a question has been answered on Lost! The shoes in the hatch hallway belonged to Locke! Now if that isn't enough for you, I don't know what is.

THE HATCHBACKS
DHARMA LOGO
As I said above, I thought how they showed the happenings in the hatch again but from Locke and Kate's points of view was great. We learned A LOT from these scenes. Here we go:
- Remember the spider web looking logo I mentioned last time? Well I am going to have to complain to DirecTV soon because all of the boarders could read that the logo said Dharma on it, while I could not make that word out, even on pause. What is Dharma, besides being one half of a cheesy 90s sitcom? Well let me drop a little m-w.com on ya:
Hinduism & Buddhism a : the basic principles of cosmic or individual existence : divine law b : conformity to one's duty and nature. So there you go (there are other variations on what Dharma means, included in attachment). Some people on the boards also brought up the fact that surrounding the Dharma logo was the bagua (also spelled Ba-Gua), a feng shui tool used to help determine preferred locations. I have attached a .gif of it in the Word document below.

Finally, upon viewing the logo very closely, it looks like some sort of silhouette of a swan or something behind the word Dharma. And one more thing, the R is backwards. Hatches R Us! (keyboard can't make a backwards r, but you get what I was trying to do).

This just in: I have met my match in nerdiness. As I mentioned briefly last week, I had shirts with various sayings from Lost made for my little premiere party. But check out how quick and ingenious this guy is! (This site may have been taken down by ABC's Man by the time you get this)(it is nothing profane, just probably some copyright infringement or something):
http://www.cafepress.com/mostlymuppet

If it's still up, click on one of the shirts, and then clock on "View Larger" and then do "Zoom in on image" and you can see the Dharma logo very magnified. If you think it's something other than a swan, let me know, as I really have no idea and no one seems to be mentioning that part of it from what I've read on the boards.

There are SO MANY theories about what the Dharma logo means, ranging from Morse code to a logo of a communications company that maybe Sun's father owned, that I can not possibly recap them all here. Needless to say, the logo can be found on:
- Desmond's coat
- The medicine injection cabinet
- The mirror system and various other places in the hatch
- Almost all food containers in the food warehouse where Kate was, and... drum roll please
- The underbelly of the shark that nearly got Sawyer. Once again, nearly impossible to see in real-time, and a shout-out to CJ who emailed me at home right away after viewing - he actually saw it on his own, impressive!

DHARMA SHARK
Although I will cop to not noticing the Dharma logo upon first viewing, I did state that I did not think it was a totally real shark, because the fin just looked way too thin and almost saw-like/metallic. However, blood did spurt up after Michael shot it, so maybe it was partially real, or all real but tattooed with the logo because it is part of the overall "security system" of the island?

DESMOND
I love Desmond! One minute he's talking to Locke and seems genuinely befuddled that "the real world is still out there?", and the next he's going berserk and taking Locke's advice to tie up Kate instead of him, and the next minute he's shooting off his gun and making quite possibly the most wacky-crazy delirious smiling face in the world at Jack at the very end. He's awesome. From the markings on the wall, it appears he's been there quite a long time (couldn't find anyone who counted them all, but I'm sure that person does exist somewhere).

Desmond asked Locke "are you him?" and when Locke first said "yes,"... I cannot lie, my heart skipped a beat and my blood ran cold and I cried inside my head, "No! Please tell me Locke is not the evil mastermind!" Luckily, it was just an attempt to stall for time, and Locke is not HIM. But then who is HIM? I would say there are three major theories on this:
1) Hurley is Him, as he was the one most connected to the numbers before the crash, and obviously the numbers play a huge role in the hatch.
2) Some unknown person is Him, and there really is a mastermind of something going on on the island
3) Desmond's eventual replacement is Him, meaning that Desmond is on a "shift" down in the hatch, and his job is to ensure that the counter always get reset. He is waiting for the next person to relieve him of his duty. On this note, there was the thought (shout-out to DW) that perhaps Lenny, the guy Hurley met in the psych ward who kept repeating the numbers
constantly, was the PREVIOUS guard in the hatch? All we know about him was that 16 years ago he was stationed in the South Pacific and heard the numbers being transmitted over the radio. We do not know what happened to him after that point to land him in the psych ward (we only knew what happened to the other guy he was with, Sam), so there is a slight chance that Lenny was perhaps the previous Hatch Man and it drove him mad.

Additionally, in that season 1 flashback, when Hurley visits him and tells him he played the numbers in the Lotto, Lenny's response was: ""You've opened the box! It won't stop! You've gotta get away from those numbers!!!!!" I guess we'll see.
4) Desmond has been down there long enough to not be sure that the outside world still exists...
5) ... but he has obviously been out on the island at some point, because he asked about the sickness
6) Did HE paint the mural? If so, we've got three artists on our hands in this show: Desmond, Michael and Claire's old boyfriend/father of Aaron, who if you remember, also painted similarly haunting images:
http://guillaumedupuis.free.fr/!/Peinture.jpg
7) Does Desmond recognize Jack? There didn't actually seem to be any sort of recognition on his end, or at least definitely not any SURPRISE upon seeing Jack. Perhaps he was expecting him? Or perhaps he doesn't remember him?
8) Contrary to what I previously said, I do now think Desmond may be alone in the hatch. And I do think Make Your Own Kind of Music had special meaning because he's been down there so long and needs to keep himself entertained. Also, the ping pong table was set up so that one person could play alone.
9) Does Desmond remember something specific that happened 44 days ago? When Locke tells him about their plane crash and when it was, Desmond kind of paused and then repeated '44 days?' I am not sure if that's because he knows of something specific that went on 44 days ago that perhaps caused their crash, or if he was just reacting to the fact that a) they'd been on the island for 44 days and had not gotten sick or b) the "real world" still existed because they mentioned they were flying from Sydney to LA. He barely remembered his own name, so I'm sure the whole thing was confusing to him.

THE COUNTDOWN
Near the end of the HatchBacks, a familiar beep starts sounding and it is clearly either a warning that someone was on the premises (Jack coming down hatch or Kate in vent), or it was an alarm sounding because the counter had to be reset. After Locke entered in The Numbers, it reset to 108 00. It was cool to see Locke hesitate and look pretty scared before hitting Execute, though.

So what exactly is the countdown counting do to? Most people seem to agree that this is a "doomsday" device, and if it is not continually reset, "something bad" will happen. That is why there always must be someone in the hatch, whose responsibility it is to reset it all the time. I have not seen any other theories than this one, except that it is a counter, but that nothing bad" will happen if it counts down all the way, and the fear is just all in Desmond's head.

KATE
My Kate Hate is waning this season, and I can only worry that it's because another female character is soon coming to usurp her position of Supremely Annoying Lostaway. But even of all the haters on the boards, everyone, and I do mean everyone, agreed that she had two of the best scenes of the show:
1) her "choco-gasm" as it was called on the boards (the candy bar had the brand Apollo on it, by the way), and
2) her hilarious "WTF?" face when Make Your Own Kind of Music starting blaring as she was crawling through the vent. She nearly got shot! Close, but no cigar.

MICHAEL'S FLASHBACKS
Only two things to note here:
1) I was remiss in including this last season, so I will say it now: Remember how Michael got hit by a car? Well supposedly that car was seen elsewhere last season, here's a quote from a Lost site: "The mystery car refers to the tan Bonneville that hit Michael, Locke and Kate." As in, the
same car hit all three of them. Coincidence? I think not!
2) Michael gave Walt a polar bear stuffed animal. Coincidence? I think NOT!

THE RAFTUGEES
You either loved these scenes or you didn't. I am in the latter camp. I felt like they were obviously trying to deepen the bond between Sawyer and Michael, but a lot of the dialogue to me seemed forced, especially on Sawyer's end. Although he did seem to figure out the whole "Those were The Others and the kid they were coming for this whole time was Walt" thing pretty quickly, I must say. I also really didn't need to see him digging out the bullet from his shoulder.

At least there was an end to the floating, as they washed back to the shore, and then found poor Jin, who was now on the set of 28 Days Later, rather than Lost. Crazy zombie-looking peeps were stumbling toward them with medieval-looking weapons. Choices are:
1) The Others
2) Other 815 Survivors who are defending their turf
3) Other 815 Survivors who have The Sickness
4) Other 815 Survivors who went all Lord of the Flies on each other
5) Combo of Others and Survivors
6) Combo of Others and Nigerian Drug Smugglers (from c@caine plane)
7) Others, Survivors AND Smugglers, oh my!

BEST LINES OF THE EPISODE:
MICHAEL: They took my son. They found us -- took Walt -- because you made me fire the flare.
SAWYER: At least Walt is on a boat -- probably wrapped in a blanket with a cup of cocoa -- while we're on this piece...
MICHAEL: Get off my raft.

LOCKE: How long have you been down here?
DESMOND: Shut it.

LOCKE: It's pointless to tie me up, I'm not dangerous. But her, she's a fugitive.
DESMOND: So, what does that make you then, brother?
LOCKE: I'm a regional collections manager for a cardboard manufacturer -- boxes primarily.
DESMOND: All right then, box man, tie her up.
(Erika's favorite scene, because of Locke's hilarious delivery:)
DESMOND (after seeing Jack in mirrors): Who the hell is that?
LOCKE: That would be Jack.

SAWYER: They found us because they were looking for us, for Walt.
MICHAEL: Don't you ever say his name again, ever.
SAWYER: Oh, what are you to do, splash me?

THIS WEEK'S EPISODE:
"Orientation"
PREVIEWS. LOOK. AWESOME.

Enjoy,
- e

S2Ep1: Man of Science, Man of Faith (Jack's fourth flashback) - 9/21/05

Hello my dear friends...
Say it with me now: LOST is BACK.... yeah, baby, yeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!

I will start out by welcoming several new members to this distribution list. I had every intention of writing each one of you a personal message, but time slipped away. Since at this point I believe there are more people on the list who actually DON'T personally know me than there are those who do, along with the fact that I'm no longer writing these from my work account,
you can expect me to "up the level of craziness" in these write-ups that much more. Hee hee. But seriously, since there are so many new people added, I have a one-time only special section at the end of this already too long recap just to set the rules of participation as well as expectations, which I beg all of you to read just this once, even the old-timers.

But first, on to the good stuff. I stayed miraculously almost entirely spoiler-free throughout the summer, and since I was out of the country for the two weeks leading up to the premiere, I hadn't even seen previews, which I'm confident made my viewing enjoyment all the greater. I recommend this approach to everyone. I was completely happy and utterly impressed with the
premiere, and have high hopes for the season. So without further ado, here are the things you may or may not have caught in the premiere, and how they may or may not tie into anything bigger.

OPENING SCENE
Those on this list who were at my place watching the premiere (my specially made shirt said "I love Locke" (love was a heart symbol) on the front and "I Hate Kate" on the back) can attest to the fact that I freaked out a little bit at the beginning of the show, thinking we were on the wrong channel. Then after I realized it was the right channel, I next thought it was a flashback, and guessed everyone from Sawyer, to Locke when he was young, to Hurley when he may have once been skinny. So obviously I had no idea what was going on as it ended up being a present-day/real-time scene of the at-that-point unknown dude in the hatch.
Important things from this scene:
- As so many episodes have in the past, this one also started with a focus on an eye opening. I still can't help but wonder if some day that will end up being significant.
- The scene begins in a bedroom. The guy wakes up from the UPPER bunk, and the lower bunk is cleanly made and there is a stack of books on a shelf near the pillow, leading me to believe our Hatch Man, as he is known on the boards, is not alone. The window behind him has blinds and daylight appears to be shining through at one point, but most people obviously now think that
it was just an artificial source of bright light. He is in all white - boxers and a t-shirt.
- He goes to an Apple II (?) computer, types in The Numbers (thank you Tivo/slo-mo), and hits the "execute" button (which I have learned from board nerds was not typically a button on this type of computer)
- "Make Your Own Kind of Music" by The Mamas & The Papas (I think) was spinnin' old school style on a record player
- Then he started going through what looked like a typical morning routine, which caused some people on the boards to point out that he was "living" down there and not "surviving" like the people above ground. He exercised on outdated equipment, had running water for a shower, electricity for a blender and washer/dryer, and some sort of weird food. At first I actually
thought he had eggs, but upon several slo-mo's and pauses, I now think what he mixed into the blender with some sort of protein powder looked like jello mold type jiggly stuff, not eggs. He's also rockin' a red lava lamp down there, so I give him respect.
- He ended his routine with what I thought was a big ol' 'roid injection, but what I now think was an immunization shot or medicine. There were several vials lined up in his cabinet, all of course which contained The Numbers on the RX, prefaced by the letters CR.
- He is interrupted by an explosion from above (Locke blowing off hatch). He immediately goes to grab one of many identical light-colored jackets from a closet, puts on boots, and then runs to a door with a combination lock... through meticulous slo-mo'ing I saw him turn to 23 then 42 and then I think either 47 or 48 (original number of survivors? or some other meaning?). He takes out a few of MANY guns, runs to some machines to power everything down and then looks through some crazy scope and adjusts several mirrors so he can actually see up to the top of the hatch and look at the Lostaways peering down... It should also be noted that both his jacket and the 'roid cabinet had the same logo on them. It is an octagon, with an S-like graphic
in the middle... it almost looks like a spiderweb.
- So ONE question has been answered, sort of... What's in The Hatch? Well, naturally... it's the Hatch Man!

"QUARANTINE" WRITTEN ON THE INSIDE OF THE LID
I'm hoping I don't need to spell this out, but just in case... that means that the hatch is the safe place to be, not the island.

JACK'S FLASHBACK, or JACK!BACK (Jack in his own flashbacks is referred to as
Flash!Jack)
Many board peeps were bitter that it was yet ANOTHER Jack!Back, and I must agree. We already know that he ended up marrying a patient of his who he miraculously fixed. So the only new things we learned, which I think we could've learned through much cooler means, were:
- Apparently the producers of Lost have the ability to travel back in time to when Matthew Fox (actor who plays Jack) was starring in the show Party of Five, because I will be d@mned if that bad hair/wig wasn't straight outta the early 90s, so much so that I honestly expected good ol' Bailey and whiny Julia and Claudia and baby Owen to pop out at any moment and that theme song by the BoDeans to start blasting over the hospital PA system.
- The man who Jack chose NOT to save was Adam Rutherford, age 57. I am SURE that this guy was either the dad or stepdad of Shannon, whose last name is also Rutherford. They just do not put in small details like that for no reason. His time of death was, of course, 8:15.
- Jack had no bedside manner and actually got some good advice from his dad, who was sober for once - Jack worked at St. Sebastian hospital. He had a number on his badge but I couldn't make it out.
- Jack had given up hope of curing Sarah and was taking out his rage like every normal guy does by attempting to do a tour de stad. We see him starting to race some other crazy guy. The conversation that then transpires after Jack twists his ankle was perhaps the most carefully
scripted we've seen thus far in the series, with gems like:
- I was ALMOST a doctor once
- So what's your excuse for running like the devil's chasing you?
- ... I'm training for a race around the world.
- You must have done something worthy of self-flagellation
- Just one thing - what if you DID fix her?, I didn't, But what if you did? You don't know her situation, that would be a miracle. And you don't believe in miracles?
- Well I'm going to give you some advice anyway. You have to lift it up.(NOT sounding like he's talking about the ankle)
- See ya in another life, yeah?
- I will get to theories on Desmond later... but I will take the time here to say that in my finale write-up from Season 1, I ended with a list of outstanding questions, one of which was "Why did Jack get divorced?" My brother was quick to point out that we only know he is no longer married. We don't know if he got divorced or if Sarah ended up dying, which I think is especially important to consider after this flashback. Perhaps his "faith" was temporarily restored when she miraculously was "fixed," but then later after they were married something happened and she died, turning him back into Man o' Science.

CreepyDrownedWalt / WALT'S WHISPERS
OK, so, here's the thing - I don't like creepy little kids. Never have, never will. Walt officially is on that list now, up there with Dakota Fanning, those twin girls from The Shining, Malachai from Children of the Corn, and so on. This scene made my top three Creepy Freakouts of the series, with the other two being Charlie hanging from the tree and Locke's freaky Boone/ "Theresa falls up the stairs" hallucination.

So what exactly was going on here? Supposedly a PA radio station played it backwards and claims that Walt is saying "Push the button no button is bad" which could be interpreted two ways: 1) Push the button. No. Button is bad. or 2) Push the button. No button is bad. Who knows if that is even what he said. If you have to go to that much effort to know what he said, I doubt it's crucial information to know, but I've been wrong before. You could tell that the scene itself was weird because his lips were moving out of sync and in general it seemed jumpy. Also he was dripping wet (at first I thought it was blood and nearly passed out) and wearing some bizarro shirt he didn't have on before. Most board people noticed he also grew approximately 12 feet over the summer. I think there are a few possible explanations:
- It was a hallucination and nothing more
- He is dead and that was his ghost
- Shannon also has "powers" and saw something that was happening off of the island
- Walt used his powers to apparate himself in front of Shannon for a few seconds to try to convey a message but wasn't able to actually say anything (note - I was positive that apparate was a real word. So a shout out to Nerdy P for being right that it is actually only a word used in the Harry Potter books. I was stunned to see it is not in the dictionary. I'm not sure if I like the fact that I didn't realize it was a made-up word from HP, or if I'm ashamed. Either way, you know what I was trying to say.)
- He somehow did fall off the boat, or escape, and "the island" is conveying a message to Shannon on his behalf I wouldn't hold your breath that we will find out any time soon. But I will
ask you to ponder this - Why did Vincent lead her there? I'll tell you why - because dogs rock, and they are smart, and Vincent is probably the mastermind of everything going on the island. You heard it here first.

JACK VS. LOCKE
The growing tension between Jack and my man Locke finally reached a breaking point as Locke (who, let's remember, was prodding Jack all last season to Be A Leader) openly defies Jack in front of the group and leaves everyone to go down the hatch, as well as asks Jack earlier what exactly he was afraid of finding down there. There were a few key shots that I thought were important and done for a reason. One was when Locke was lowering Kate down the hatch, his palms soon became totally bloody as she was dragged down and he tried to pull against the force taking her. The other shot was when Jack went down, they showed him ripping off rags to tie around both of his palms beforehand. I'm sure the Man of Science, Man of Faith title and the bloody palms and religious symbolism they carry are all tied together.

ENDING SCENE
Jack drops down the hatch, and is met with a dark, damp concrete hallway with dripping water and big pipes all around. He noticed a pair of shoes on the floor - which I think may be Kate's because they looked small, but could also obviously be Locke's, or I guess could also be Desmond's. There are electrical outlets and moldy-looking corroded ceilings, actually bringing
back bad memories of old rented apartments of yore. He passes a berzerker mural made from various colored paints that were still sitting out. The mural included:
- An underground house,
- The phrase "I'm Sick",
- Arrows pointing up from the house to a beach scene,
- The sun with the number 108 in it (all the numbers added up)
- A woman's face who may or may not resemble Danielle the French woman,
- The numbers "108" and "42" were painted in various other spots as well, as well as what also looked like a few fish

Jack continues trolling around and sees a bunch of buckets that appear to be open and have dirty dusty crap overflowing from them. The key around his neck starts moving toward the wall, which is undoubtedly a big part of whatever it is that is going on. In Season 1 we realized that the compasses didn't work, the tides were all screwed up, and many people also thought the
floating black stuff could possibly be a bunch of little magnets making forms together.

Now the Freaky Factor escalates, as Jack turns the corner and a mirror readjusts to follow him, and the eerily happy "Make Your Own Kind of Music" starts blaring again. He's now moved into a big domed control room, with tons of machines with wave-like readings, spools twirling, and sounds that are a lot like those Lostzilla makes... He is about to hit the "execute" button (um, let's just all agree that of all things to do when you're finally in the hatch, pressing buttons randomly is probably not a good idea), and Locke appears to say "I wouldn't do that." A heated exchange ensues, during which Locke tries to tell Jack to calm down and that Kate is fine, but Jack is flipping out to the point that Brother Desmond must shoot the gun off in the ceiling and then finally reveal himself to Jack. We end with a stunned "You." from Jack.

DESMOND
- Another anagram - "Demons" with an extra D. However, I will say that the Desmond in the stadium seemed like a totally normal, nice guy. - Is Desmond the devil? Did he meet all of the Lostaways before the crash and did they somehow unknowingly or unwittingly "sell their soul" to him? He really didn't seem evil in the Jack!Back though.
- Did he really attempt to go on his race around the world and somehow he also was destined to land on the island? Is the hatch the crazy vessel he was using for his journey and it somehow ran aground? If so, when did he arrive and how long has he been there?
- He obviously wants to STAY in the hatch (quarantine lid, he didn't come out, he's got tons of guns and an elaborate system to protect himself, etc., etc). I feel like the song he was playing symbolized a lonely life where you need to find happiness in a repetitive existence on your own. He was definitely just hangin' out down there. But he must have been there a while if he knew the island was dangerous and if he was injecting himself with something to fight off "the sickness," perhaps?
- What is the logo on his shirt (I think it also appeared on the mirror system)? What was he injecting? What was the program he executes? Some think it is a virtual reality program for HIM to liven up his time down there. I think he may control Lostzilla and Lostzilla keeps people away from his lair.
- Is he alone? How big is the hatch?
- Where is Kate? A huge column of white light appeared before she vanished, so something different may have happened to her... we can only hope.
- Why is Locke so calm? Had HE met Desmond before? If Sarah miraculously was fixed after Jack talked with Desmond in the stadium, and Locke could miraculously walk again after landing on the island, was Desmond somehow involved in both?
- Is that NOT Desmond but perhaps an evil twin? Yes, I know evil twins are lame (sorry, Nick), but we do know that supposedly there were evil twin guys on the Others' boat... so perhaps there are clones running around...
- Is Desmond connected with The Others? I actually don't think he is.
- Whose d@mn shoes were those? Come on, writers, throw us a bone!

MAN OF SCIENCE, MAN OF FAITH
Is this title of the episode referring to Jack vs. Locke?...
... or Jack vs. Desmond?
... or Jack vs. himself at different points in his life?

BEST LINES OF THE EPISODE
Hurley: Why did you do that? Why'd you light the fuse, man?
Locke: Why wouldn't I light the fuse?
Hurley: Ah, maybe because I was running toward you, waving my arm, saying 'don't do that'?
Locke: (laughs) You got a point there.

Hurley: What's that thing where doctors make you feel better, just by talking to you?
Jack: Bedside manner
Hurley: Yeah, that. Yours sucks, dude.

NEXT WEEK'S EPISODE:
"Adrift" - focusing on the raft-ugees
(There appear to be three more episodes lined up after this week's with no lame hiatuses... we'll see...)

SPECIAL ONE-TIME SECTION
RULES FOR SEASON 2 WRITE-UPS/PLEA TO YOU, MY FAITHFUL READERS
After rejoining the boards for the first time since the finale, the full weight of how proportionate my enjoyment of the show is to my lack of spoiler knowledge was very obvious. So many hard core people on the boards were disappointed in the premiere whereas I thought it was fantastic. That is because they all knew about Desmond, they all knew about Walt appearing, and already know half of what is going to happen this season, whereas I, blissfully, know nothing.

And I'd like to keep it that way.

What brief periods of respite and escapism can be found in life must be closely defended... so therefore I just want to set a rule going forward for season 2... I do not want anyone to send me any spoilers whatsoever. If you hear something or read something about the show... please do not assume I also have heard or read the same information, because I go to great lengths to now avoid it. If you send me some sort of spoiler, well, consider yourself banned from this distribution list at the very least while my evil warped mind thinks of better ways to punish you. HOWEVER, having said that, part of the great joy I find in this show and going on the theory boards is that I DO love to hear what people THINK (as opposed to KNOW) is going to happen, what theories anyone has, etc., etc., so by all means if you have an idea that is truly your own and is not a confirmed spoiler, or have read about a cool theory on the boards, please send my way and I will include in the write-up for others to ponder. Examples from last season include the time-loop theory, the "everyone represents a different part of a personality" (aka Blank Slate/Tabula Rasa) theory, the virtual reality game theory, and all others included in this write-up today about who Desmond is, etc.

Finally, here is a pic of the cast after winning Best Drama at the Emmys.





Enjoy tonight's show,
- e